NBC’s A “Stakeholder” In Podcasting

Today’s Wall Street Journal looks at big media’s interest in podcasting:

“In May, ABC and General Electric Co.’s NBC announced podcasting projects from their news divisions on the same day. Jeff Gralnick, a veteran television news producer and consultant to NBC, said the network felt compelled to announce its podcast plans before its shows were officially released because ABC had announced its own efforts. Both networks offer mostly edited clips from existing television news shows such as Nightline, along with some content available only in podcast format.

Mr. Gralnick says NBC approved its podcasting project quickly, without hand-wringing over whether the network can make money from the effort. ‘You need to become a stakeholder and you need to be a first adopter of technology,’ he says. ‘As it becomes a generally adopted technology people know you are there. Revenue for podcasting is over the horizon.'”